Mid-Hudson 'Redeem Team' earns two basketball wins

When Crawford's display was over, he scored 24 points — hitting six 3-pointers. He's put up plenty of double-figure games at Valley Central over the last two years, but none like this. For Crawford, a 6-foot-7 center entering his senior year, the six 3-pointers were a career-high.

His big game helped the Mid-Hudson team to an 86-72 win over Southern Tier at the Basketball Coaches Association of New York festival in Johnson City.

Earlier in the day, the Mid-Hudson defeated New York City 80-51 behind 23 points by Kingston's D.J. Mapes.

"(Guards) Donovan Fields and Justin Robinson just kept getting me the ball, so I kept shooting," Crawford said. "Everything was going down and it felt good, especially with all of my teammates screaming and hollering from the bench. I was hot this game and it's a lot of fun playing with this team."

The Mid-Hudson is now playing like Section 9's own version of "The Redeem Team" — the nickname for the 2008 U.S. Olympic men's basketball team. Coached by S.S. Seward's Rob Gravelle, Team Mid-Hudson is 2-0, after going 0-4 last year. The Mid-Hudson takes on Adirondack at 9 a.m. Saturday and Central at 11:30 a.m. with a chance to reach Sunday's medal round.

Kingston point guard Justin Robinson had 13 points against New York City and nine versus Southern Tier. Zach Bouton, Cornwall's sharpshooter, put up 10 against New York City and eight against Southern Tier.

"The way this team moves the ball it's like they have played together forever," Gravelle said. "They are pretty focused and close-knit. They really want to represent Section 9 up here and they are playing well."